Israel Regardie Golden Dawn System Magic Book Review

English language occultist 1907–1985)

Francis Israel Regardie
A promotional image of Israel Regardie
Born	Francis Israel Regudy (1907-11-17)November 17, 1907 London, England
Died	March 10, 1985(1985-03-10) (anile 77) Sedona, Arizona, US
Nationality	American
Teaching	Doctor of Chiropractic
Alma mater	Chiropractic College of New York
Occupation	Occultist and author
Known for	Stella Matutina

Francis Israel Regardie (; né Regardie; November 17, 1907 – March 10, 1985) was an English occultist, ceremonial magician, and writer who spent much of his life in the Us. He wrote fifteen books on the subject of occultism.

Born to a working-class Orthodox Jewish family in the East End of London, Regardie and his family soon moved to Washington, D.C. in the United States. Regardie rejected Orthodox Judaism during his teenage years and took an interest in Theosophy, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jewish mysticism. It was through his interest in yoga that he encountered the writings of the occultist Aleister Crowley. Contacting Crowley, he was invited to serve every bit the occultist's secretary, necessitating a move to Paris, France in 1928. He followed Crowley to England earlier their association ended. Living in England, he wrote two books on the Qabalah, A Garden of Pomegranates and The Tree of Life. In 1934 he then joined the Stella Matutina—a formalism magic order descended from the defunct Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn—but grew dissatisfied with its leadership and left. He also studied psychology, being particularly influenced by ideas from Jungian psychology, and explored Christian mysticism.

In 1937 he returned to the United States. Concerned that the Golden Dawn system of ceremonial magic would exist lost, he published the Stella Matutina rituals in a serial of books between 1938 and 1940. This entailed breaking his adjuration of secrecy and brought anger from many other occultists. During the 2nd World War he served in the U.S. Ground forces. On returning to the U.S., he gained a doctorate in psychology before relocating to Los Angeles in 1947 and setting upwardly do as a chiropractor. In 1981 he retired and moved to Sedona, Arizona, where he died of a middle assail four years later.

Biography [edit]

Early life: 1907–1931 [edit]

Regardie was built-in Israel Regudy on 17 November 1907 off of the Mile End Road in London's East End, then a poor surface area.^[1] His parents, Barnet Regudy, a cigarette maker, and Phoebe Perry, were poor orthodox Jewish immigrants from Zhitomir, Russian Empire (present-day Ukraine).^{[one] [2]} His family changed their surname to "Regardie" afterward a clerical mixup resulted in State of israel's elderberry brother being enrolled in the British Army nether that name.^{[i] [2]} Regardie emigrated with his parents to the United States in August 1921 and settled in Washington, DC.^{[ane] [two]} Regardie'due south parents were Orthodox Jews who believed that the Talmudic stories were literally true.^[iii] With a Hebrew tutor he gained a linguistic knowledge which would prove invaluable in his afterward studies of Hermetic Qabalah.^[4] In his teenage years, Regardie rejected this parental religion, coming to draw Judaism as "a load of rubbish".^[5] He began reading the work of Helena Blavatsky, the founder of Theosophy.^{[half dozen]} From at that place, he read Hindu texts similar the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita also as Buddhist texts similar the Dhammapada and the Milinda Panha.^[seven]

Regardie became secretary for Aleister Crowley

Interested in becoming a painter, he studied at an art school in Philadelphia.^[1] He as well joined the Societas Rosicruciana in America at around this time.^[8] While in Washington DC he came across a give-and-take of yoga in Book 4, a piece of work past the occultist Aleister Crowley.^[9] Impressed by it, he wrote to Crowley via the latter's publisher, receiving a response eight months subsequently.^[x] Crowley advised Regardie to see with Karl Germer, his amanuensis in the United States. Regardie visited Germer in New York City, where he purchased the ten volume of Crowley's periodical, The Equinox.^[eleven] In March 1926 he was initiated into the 0=0 degree of the Washington College of the Societas Rosicruciana in America, subsequently being initiated into the Zelator class in June 1927.^[12]

Through Crowley'due south work, Regardie moved from the practise of yoga to that of formalism magic.^[thirteen] When Crowley asked Regardie to travel to Paris to serve as his personal secretary, the young homo agreed; he told his parents that he would be studying with an English language painter in Paris.^[14] In October 1928, Regardie sailed from New York Metropolis to Paris.^[15] Regardie hoped that Crowley would personally instruct him in occult practices, but this did not occur; Crowley expected his pupils to learn things for themselves and simply seek his advice when in difficulty.^[sixteen] Crowley urged Regardie to overcome his inhibitions, including by visiting prostitutes to lose his virginity;^[17] from one of these encounters he reportedly contracted gonorrhoea.^[18] Regardie spent much time studying Crowley's fabric, both published and unpublished.^[nineteen] As a magical name, he took "Frater NChSh" ("The Serpent"), although too became known equally "Begetter Scorpio".^[twenty] Through his involvement with Crowley, Regardie came to know Gerald Yorke, although the duo never became friends.^[21] Crowley would sometimes play two simultaneous games of chess, one with Regardie and the other with Yorke.^[12]

In January 1929, Regardie was hospitalised for a period.^[18] And then, in March, Regardie's sister—who had become enlightened of the content of Crowley's writings—contacted the French government to urge them to investigate what had happened to her brother. The Sûreté Générale did so, discovering that Regardie did non take an identity bill of fare permitting him residence in France. He received an expulsion discover giving him 24 hours to leave the country; Crowley was soon also ordered to go out.^[22] Regardie moved to Brussels in Belgium, where he began a relationship with Crowley's and then-lover, Maria Theresa Ferrari de Miramar.^[23] Crowley had returned to England, and in late 1929 Regardie joined him there, living in Knockholt, Kent.^[24] Crowley could no longer afford to go along Regardie as his secretary and the pair parted amicably.^[25] Regardie so became secretary to the author Thomas Burke, who encouraged his own literary intentions.^[25]

Early on literary career: 1932–1937 [edit]

While visiting North Devon, Regardie began writing a book on Qabalah, for which he drew upon the writings of occultists like Crowley, Éliphas Lévi, and A. E. Waite. The result, A Garden of Pomegranates, was published by Passenger and Company in 1932.^[26] He dedicated the book to Crowley.^[27] He followed this with a more substantial book on Qabalah, The Tree of Life: A Study in Magic.^[28] Among those to read the piece of work was the occultist Dion Fortune, who considered it to be "quite the best book on magic" that she had read.^[29] She and Regardie met, but while the latter admired her writings he was unimpressed with her in person.^[thirty] Regardie later publicly criticised her for misrepresenting his works in her reviews of them; she had claimed that his works bolstered her beliefs about the Masters, although Regardie insisted that he was sceptical about the beingness of such entities.^[31]

The publication of works on Qabalah aimed at a general audience angered some occultists who thought Regardie was sharing information too widely.^[xxx] As a event of the controversy, in 1934 he made contact with members of the Stella Matutina, a ceremonial magic occultist lodge that had branched off the since defunct Hermetic Social club of the Golden Dawn. With Crowley's blessing, he was initiated into the group, taking on the magical proper name "Ad Majorem Adonai Gloriam".^[32] He rapidly progressed through the grades of the society, reaching that of Zelator Adeptus Minor, but grew disillusioned with the grouping'southward leaders, regarding them as beingness egotistical and preoccupied with collecting grandiose titles.^[33] He resolved to publish the grouping'south ritual fabric, assertive that it would ensure that the Aureate Dawn ritual system was not lost and would benefit a far wider range of people; this would entail breaking the oath of secrecy he took upon entering the order.^[34] In February 1935, Regardie finished writing My Rosicrucian Take chances, which was published equally What Y'all Should Know virtually the Golden Dawn.^[34]

His literary endeavours brought Regardie little money and while in England he lived largely in poverty.^[35] Regardie had a growing passion for psychology and studied psychoanalysis through a Jungian framework under Due east. Clegg and J. L. Bendit.^[36] Although influenced by Jungian psychology, he disagreed with some of the ideas of its founder, Carl Jung, such as the idea that all humans could be classified equally either introverts or extroverts, something that Regardie accounted too simplistic.^[37] He also began exploring Christian mysticism.^[38] He was particularly attracted to the effigy of Francis of Assisi;^[39] he began using the name "Francis" himself afterward he was given information technology by a woman he was in a relationship with.^[39]

Back in the Usa: 1937–1950 [edit]

In 1937 he decided to return to the The states after nine years abroad.^[40] Presently afterward doing so, Regardie and Crowley roughshod out. Regardie sent Crowley a re-create of his latest publication; the latter'south response made fun of Regardie's use of the name "Francis", calling him "Frank", and including an anti-semitic slur. Regardie wrote an angry letter dorsum, calling Crowley "Alice" and describing him equally "a contemptible bowwow".^[41] Crowley then circulated a certificate attacking Regardie, accusing him of exploiting his benefactors and of contracting gonorrhoea.^[42] This incident led Regardie to altitude himself from occultism for several years.^[43]

In 1938 his volume, The Philosopher's Stone, was published; information technology examined abracadabra through the lens of psychology, seeking psychological interpretations for alchemical symbolism. Regardie afterwards came to turn down this agreement of abracadabra, referring to it equally "past far my worst volume" and regretting having written it.^[44] From 1938 to 1940, Aries Press of Chicago published 4 volumes of Golden Dawn fabric edited by Regardie. Information technology sold slowly.^[45] The historian Richard Kaczynski noted that "it quickly became a classic".^[46] For this act he was vilified by many in the occultist community, some of whom cursed him.^[47] Crowley claimed that the publication of this material was "pure theft", although he had personally published Gilt Dawn ritual fabric himself.^[46] The published textile influenced many readers, resulting in the formation of many groups that used the Gilded Dawn rituals as a basis.^[48]

In the U.S., he focused his attentions on psychotherapy and specially the work of Wilhelm Reich.^[49] He studies at the Chiropractic College of New York City, graduating in 1941.^[49] Afterward the The states joined the 2nd Earth War, Regardie joined the Usa Army, serving with them between 1942 and 1945.^[49] After the war he returned to the U.S. and obtained a doctorate in psychology.^[49] His involvement in Reichian ideas influenced the exercises put forward in his book Exist Yourself - The Art of Relaxation.^[fifty] He followed this work with The Eye Pillar and The Fine art of Truthful Healing, in which he showcased his psychological arroyo to Qabalistic magical practices.^[51]

Maintaining his interest in Christian mysticism, Regardie began exploring Christian Scientific discipline and New Thought, both movements that stressed the ability to heal sickness with thought.^[52] In 1946 his book on the subject, The Romance of Metaphysics, was published; it would be republished every bit The Teachers of Fulfilment.^[53] In 1947, Regardie moved to Los Angeles, where he set up do as a chiropractor.^[49] For some of his clients, he also engaged in psychotherapy and used Reichian tactics to heal their ailments.^[54] This career proved a financial success, eventually earning eighty,000 dollars a year.^[55] He too taught psychiatry at the Los Angeles College of Chiropractic.^[49] He contributed articles to the Psychiatric Quarterly and The American Journal of Psychotherapy.^[49]

Developing career: 1951–1979 [edit]

Regardie was on friendly terms with Grady McMurtry (pictured); the latter asked for Regardie's blessing before relaunching the Ordo Templi Orientis

Throughout the 1950s, Regardie continued to avoid much contact with the occultist motion.^[55] He consistently avoided the public eye, refusing interviews to announced on radio and boob tube; he was concerned that publicity would bring with it persecution.^[56] Similar Crowley, Regardie was interested in mind-altering substances, and in the 1950s he experimented with using LSD under laboratory weather.^[57]

Regardie began editing various of Crowley's writings for republication, among them Book 4, Three Holy Books, AHA!, The Vision and the Vox, The World's Tragedy, Magick without Tears, and an edited collection chosen The Best of Crowley.^[58] In the 1970s, The Golden Dawn volumes were republished, selling more briskly than they had on get-go publication.^[59]

Although he had ended his association with Crowley on bad terms, he was angered on reading the starting time biography of Crowley, The Swell Animate being by John Symonds, which he thought was unduly negative and failed to understand Crowley'south beliefs. Regardie decided to write his own book well-nigh Crowley, merely it took over a decade to produce.^[lx] In 1970, Regardie's The Centre in the Triangle: An Interpretation of Aleister Crowley, was published. The work starts as a memoir of Regardie's time with Crowley earlier moving on to a biographical account of the occultist'southward life up till 1914. By that point, Regardie believed, Crowley had achieved everything of significance in his life.^[61] In the work, Regardie sought to balance his appreciation for Crowley with a word of what he saw equally the man's faults.^[62] In The Eye in the Triangle, Regardie argued that Aiwass—the entity whom Crowley claimed had given him The Volume of the Police force in 1904—was actually a facet of Crowley'south own psyche.^[63]

He also wrote other works. I was Twelve Steps to Spiritual Enlightenment, a textbook on how to practice magic that was later republished as The Ane Year Transmission.^[64] Subsequent books, published by the U.k.-based Aquarian Press, included A Practical Guide to Geomantic Divination and How to Make and Use Talismans.^[64]

Regardie'due south works gained a growing readership in the Counterculture of the 1960s.^[65] He received correspondence from many of his readers, much of which he thought was unhinged; he collected these in a manuscript he called Liber Nuts.^[66] His house was burgled twice, with the burglars seeking to steal Golden Dawn and Crowleyan textile.^[66] He befriended various occultists, including Christopher Hyatt.^[59] He also established friendly contact with the author Robert Anton Wilson, who provided an introduction for the third edition of The Centre in the Triangle.^[59] He corresponded over again with Yorke, who was now a Tibetan Buddhist.^[67] He also became friends with the Thelemite Grady McMurtry, who asked for his and Yorke's approval before relaunching the Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO) from his Berkeley home.^[59] Regardie never joined the OTO, but wished it well.^[67] He was as well an acquaintance of the drug use proponent Timothy Leary.^[56]

Later life: 1980–1985 [edit]

In 1980, Regardie'due south Formalism Magic: A Guide to the Mechanisms of Ritual was published in both the UK and The states.^[68] In this book, he encouraged prospective ceremonial magicians to engage in self-initiation.^[68] By the 1980s, Regardie had developed a deep dislike of Christianity.^[69] He came to believe that Jesus of Nazareth had never existed, and that the myth effectually him was derived from that of the ancient Egyptian god Osiris.^[53]

In 1981, Regardie began instructing a adult female in the Gilt Dawn organization. She went on to found a temple in Los Angeles, for which Regardie agreed to human action equally a consultant if they ran into difficulty.^[seventy] Among the group's members was Gerald Suster, later a author on occultism.^[71] The grouping was damaged by personality differences and concluded up in schism.^[71] In 1981, Regardie retired from his chiropractic clinic and left Los Angeles for Sedona, Arizona.^[59] In 1984, Regardie's The Complete Gilt Dawn System of Magic, a book over a thousand pages long, was published.^[72]

In 1983 he visited Republic of the fiji islands, Australia, and New Zealand; in February 1984 he visited Hawaii and considered moving there.^[73] Regardie died from a heart attack in the presence of close friends during a dinner at a Sedona eatery on March 10, 1985 at the age of 77.^{[74] [75]} He left his coin to his nephew, a lawyer in New York City.^[76] Other fabric was left to Christopher Hyatt, who established the State of israel Regardie Foundation.^[76]

Personal life [edit]

Over the class of his life, Regardie married and divorced three times; he had no children.^[55]

Regardie suffered from asthma, sometimes known as "the occultist's disease" within the occult community.^[36] Suster noted that, in old age at to the lowest degree, Regardie had "a about delightful sense of humor".^[77] He was a fan of battle; it was one of the few things he would lookout man on television.^[78] He enjoyed cannabis and, in later life, used LSD around one time a year.^[57]

Legacy [edit]

Regardie is a principal reliable source for much of what is known about the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. His writings and the students he taught or influenced provide much of the foundation for modern Western occultism. In add-on to preserving the knowledge, Regardie also preserved a valid branch of the initiatory lineage of the Aureate Dawn in America:

The 2d significant task carried out by Regardie was, as an Adept, to bring a valid co-operative of the initiatory lineage of the Gold Dawn to America the alchemical melting pot where the New Age was incubating. Such tasks are not always easy. A. M. A. 1000. waited here 4 decades until the threads of the pattern came together. Then, in ane of those svelte synchronicities which often play midwife to meaning magical events, a couple in Georgia were inspired—at that time scarcely aware of what they were undertaking — to build a Rosicrucian Vault, the powerful ritual bedchamber required to laissez passer on the Adept Initiation, at precisely the time when ii magicians (1 on the east coast of the United states of america and one on the west coast), unknown to each other or to the Georgia couple, came to be set up to receive that Initiation. And A.Thou.A.Thousand., with the correct to confer the Initiation in such a Vault, was the connecting link among them. And then, in one remarkable weekend, Regardie presided over two Initiations into the Inner Order, the first and the last which he ever performed; and the Lamp of the Keryx was passed into American hands. — Forrest, Adam P. in Cicero (1995), p. 541

Annotation: in the to a higher place paragraph, A.M.A.1000. refers to Regardie. Participants in the Order took on a pseudonym or magical motto. In Regardie'southward case, his motto was Ad Majorem Adonai Gloriam which means "To the Greater Glory of Adonai".

In his biography of Regardie, Gerald Suster described him as "one of the almost of import figures in the twentieth-century development of what some have chosen the Western Esoteric Tradition".^[79]

Partial bibliography [edit]

• A Garden of Pomegranates: an outline of the qabalah (1932)
• The Tree of Life: a study in magic (1932)
• The Art of True Healing: the unlimited power of prayer and visualisation (1932)
• My Rosicrucian Run a risk (1936)
• The Golden Dawn: the original business relationship of the teachings, rites and ceremonies of the hermetic order [4 volumes]  (1937–1940)
• The Middle Colonnade: the residual between mind and magic (1938)
• The Philosopher's Stone (1938)
• The Romance of Metaphysics (1945)
• The Art and Significant of Magic (1964)
• Be Yourself, the Art of Relaxation (1965)
• Twelve Steps to Spiritual Enlightenment (1969)
• The Eye in the Triangle (1970)
• Foundation of Practical Magic: an introduction to qabalistic, magical and meditative techniques (1979)
• The Portable Complete Gilded Dawn Arrangement of Magic (1984)

Run into as well [edit]

• List of occultists

References [edit]

Footnotes [edit]

1. ^ ^{a b c d e} Suster 1990, p. one; Kaczynski 2010, p. 432.
2. ^ ^{a b c} Cicero 1997.
3. ^ Suster 1990, p. four.
4. ^ Regardie 1998, p. xv.
5. ^ Suster 1990, pp. v, six.
6. ^ Suster 1990, pp. one, viii; Kaczynski 2010, p. 432.
7. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 13–14.
8. ^ SRIA: Dr. Israel Regardie Archived 2007-07-14 at the Wayback Motorcar
9. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 16–17; Kaczynski 2010, p. 432.
10. ^ Suster 1990, p. 17.
11. ^ Suster 1990, p. 17; Kaczynski 2010, p. 432.
12. ^ ^{a b} Kaczynski 2010, p. 432.
13. ^ Suster 1990, p. 25; Kaczynski 2010, p. 432.
14. ^ Suster 1990, p. 30; Kaczynski 2010, p. 432.
15. ^ Suster 1990, p. 30.
16. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 37, 40.
17. ^ Suster 1990, p. 40; Kaczynski 2010, p. 433.
18. ^ ^{a b} Kaczynski 2010, p. 437.
19. ^ Suster 1990, p. 41.
20. ^ Suster 1990, p. 42; Kaczynski 2010, p. 432.
21. ^ Suster 1990, p. 39.
22. ^ Suster 1990, p. 45; Kaczynski 2010, pp. 437–438.
23. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 45–46; Kaczynski 2010, p. 439.
24. ^ Suster 1990, p. 46; Kaczynski 2010, p. 441–442.
25. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 47.
26. ^ Suster 1990, p. 52.
27. ^ Suster 1990, p. 57.
28. ^ Suster 1990, p. 58.
29. ^ Knight 2000, pp. 198–200.
30. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 61.
31. ^ Knight 2000, p. 203.
32. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 61, 73; Kaczynski 2010, p. 494.
33. ^ Suster 1990, p. 73.
34. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 74.
35. ^ Suster 1990, p. 100.
36. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 79.
37. ^ Suster 1990, p. 88.
38. ^ Suster 1990, p. 95.
39. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 96.
40. ^ Suster 1990, p. 108.
41. ^ Suster 1990, p. 48; Kaczynski 2010, p. 495.
42. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 49–50; Kaczynski 2010, p. 495.
43. ^ Suster 1990, p. 50.
44. ^ Suster 1990, p. 106.
45. ^ Suster 1990, p. 75; Kaczynski 2010, p. 494.
46. ^ ^{a b} Kaczynski 2010, p. 495.
47. ^ Suster 1990, p. 75.
48. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 76–77.
49. ^ ^{a b c d e f g} Suster 1990, p. 110.
50. ^ Suster 1990, p. 115.
51. ^ Suster 1990, p. 117.
52. ^ Suster 1990, p. 97.
53. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 98.
54. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 110, 124.
55. ^ ^{a b c} Suster 1990, p. 123.
56. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 141.
57. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 143.
58. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 132–133.
59. ^ ^{a b c d e} Suster 1990, p. 149.
60. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 127–128.
61. ^ Suster 1990, p. 128.
62. ^ Suster 1990, p. 132.
63. ^ Suster 1990, p. 133.
64. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 144.
65. ^ Suster 1990, p. 140.
66. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 147.
67. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 150.
68. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 145.
69. ^ Suster 1990, p. 99.
70. ^ Suster 1990, pp. 150–151.
71. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 151.
72. ^ Suster 1990, p. 153.
73. ^ Suster 1990, p. 175.
74. ^ Suster 1990, p. 178.
75. ^ Regardie 1998, p. xxi.
76. ^ ^{a b} Suster 1990, p. 179.
77. ^ Suster 1990, p. 59.
78. ^ Suster 1990, p. 173.
79. ^ Suster 1990, p. vii.

Bibliography [edit]

• Cicero, Chic and Sandra Tabatha Cicero (1997), Israel Regardie, archived from the original on 2006-04-24
• Kaczynski, Richard (2010). Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley (second ed.). Berkeley, California: North Atlantic Books. ISBN978-0-312-25243-4.
• Knight, Gareth (2000). Dion Fortune and the Inner Light. Loughborough: Thoth Publications. ISBN978-i-870450-45-iv.
• Regardie, Israel (1998). The Center Pillar: The Remainder Betwixt Mind and Magic (third ed.). St. Paul: Llewellyn. ISBNane-56718-140-6.
• Suster, Gerald (1990). Crowley's Apprentice: The Life and Ideas of Israel Regardie. York Beach, Maine: Samuel Weiser Inc. ISBN0-87728-700-vii.

Farther reading [edit]

• Cicero, Chichi and Sandra Tabatha Cicero (1995). Secrets of a Golden Dawn Temple. Llewellyn Publications. ISBN 0-87542-150-4

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Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Regardie

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